I saw you had posted, something along the lines of, books that explore dark themes should be read in order for us to learn evil in this world, and to learn that it's wrong. But fiction doesn't affect reality, then why would anybody learn anything from exploring dark themes in a book? Learning means being affected. Tbh tbh the biggest importance of that applies to learning IRL/receiving information, not from books. How do these ideas coexist with one another? How does "fiction doesn't affect reality" and "we can learn from fiction" line up lol? I don't mean this as an argument, just curious as to what u meant
when I say “fiction doesn’t affect reality”, what I mean is “if someone lets fiction affect their reality in a way that they believe bad things in fiction are okay in real life because they’re portrayed as such in fiction, then chances are that with or without the fiction they consume, they are already troubled and they need help. but their inability to separate fiction from reality is not artists’ responsibility. because artists are not their parents or babysitters.” I have always said this in most of my posts that say fiction doesn’t affect reality.
normal people can learn why these bad things in fiction are wrong in real life (or if they just want to consume them for entertainment, that’s fine too), fiction has helped me understand more about how manipulation works, for instance. that’s how fiction affects me in a positive way (so I know when/if someone tries to manipulate me). but normal people don’t read a fic with cannibalism and think “oh! okay, I should start eating people too!” that’s how fiction doesn’t affect reality.
Also, you can learn all sorts of things from fiction? It's a safe way to learn about things you don't want to or can't experience yourself, and it can teach you your limits. If poop in fiction makes you uncomfy, maybe don't work in fields where you encounter poop? If killing makes you uncomfortable, maybe don't become a soldier/cop? If sex makes you uncomfortable, don't work in porn industry or do sex work? I always remember that one Batman fic where the author realised they grew up in a cult because they were researching cults for the fic. Fiction can literally teach us how to recognise dark stuff in our own lives, like signs of abuse which makes it a useful tool. It's also easier to hide if a piece of fiction is about abuse than a non-fiction book called Abuse 101 - abuser can clock the second one much easier and prevent their victim from reading it, than a random fiction book where abuse might be a more hidden theme.
I'm aroace, so I use things I learn from fiction to help relate/parse out relationship things, so I can talk/hype up/sympathise/offer my two cents if people I know have a relationship wins or fails. I have no personal experience and no interest in gaining any, so I use fiction as my benchmark and what sorts of things are average, and how people react to those. Does it always work? No, but it works better than me forcing myself into uncomfortable real world situations to learn about it, especially because I would probably develop "all dating/sex is bad" mentality. I'll take my lessons from fiction, thanks.
Also, to bring this back to why censorship is stupid, if we set the line of censorship to what makes me, personally, uncomfortable, all kissing would have been banned in kids movies when I was a kid because that shit made me uncomfortable and I cut the Disney movie off or stopped watching before the kiss. It doesn't make me uncomfy anymore but I do feel it's often trite and boring. It's also that in a lot of adult media and some of it does make me uncomfortable but I'm not asking folks to ban spicy books because censorship is stupid and dangerous.
(And also, I read those because I'm a library worker and I might as well know what my shelves offer.)
